Season 49, Game 08
San Antonio 113, Portland 101
6-2

Late in the 4th quarter, when the game was (mostly) decided, Damian Lillard drove to the rim, seemingly headed for an easy lay-up. As Lillard went up and the ball left his hand, LaMarcus Aldridge recovered from behind to swat the ball away, off the backboard, propelling the Spurs’ offense in the opposite direction.

That must have felt nice.

Aldridge’s return to Portland might be the dramatic high-mark for a Spurs’ squad loathe to even think the word “drama”. As returns go, it was pretty undramatic. The Blazers fans cheered in the introductions, then booed whenever he touched the ball. Beyond that, not much else.

Aldridge was great for the Blazers, but his departure opened the way for this new squad which is young and fast and exciting and full of possibility. There’s no way to know what the Blazers would be like if he had stayed, but there is a real possibility that team had already reached its maximum potential. Perhaps the break-up benefited both parties.

Plus, fans in Portland, when hearing that he was leaving for the Spurs, would just look at me and shrug as if to say: who can blame him? I think every fan in the NBA kind of knows deep down that there aren’t many situations better than San Antonio.

Amidst all of that, there was still a basketball game to be played. I don’t care who is on either team, I will always feel nervous playing in Portland. Maybe I’m scarred from seeing the Spurs defeated too many times in person in the Rose Garden (it will always be the Rose Garden to Portlanders), including the worst defeat in Pop’s tenure, a 40-point spanking a few years ago. Maybe it’s that the Blazers are the ONLY team with a cumulative winning record against the Spurs over the last 8 years or so. (And it’s not really that close.)

Despite the composition of both squads, I expected to lose Wednesday’s game.

This got me thinking about something else: I’ve been awfully hard on the squad in this early season, particularly the starting unit (-14 last night as a 5-man unit). The team just doesn’t look fluid or cohesive to me. If I pull my head out of Spurs’ myopia for a minute, though, the team is 6-2, second in the West, has the 2nd best overall defense in the NBA, and is arguably the 2nd or 3rd best team in the league right now.

So let’s “Glass half full” it today. The team is still figuring out how everything works together, and is already at the top of the league. Just imagine how great it will be once LaMarcus gets more comfortable and that starting unit gels. If the offense can catch up to the defense, the Warriors and the Spurs will be leagues ahead of the pack.

And LaMarcus is slowly but surely looking more comfortable each game. Against the Blazers, in a gym he knows well, his shot finally looked like the smooth and silky jumper we’ve seen so much over the last 9 years. His decision making is speeding up as well, as his understanding of the offense becomes more instinctual and automatic. He struggled a bit at the rim, but the looks were there and, more importantly, he was there. A few more games and those moves and decisions will be more automatic, as well.

This is the Spurs only trip to Portland this year, LaMarcus and the Spurs one brush with “drama”. They played; they won; they had dinner. Time to get back to work.

The Spurs return home to face Philadelphia on Saturday night.

Go Spurs Go.